Mortgage in Dover........low closing costs??? (Pike Creek: sale, real estate, to rent)

[rothbear]

We are getting near time to consider applying for a mortgage for our new house in Dover. We will only have it for a couple of months to tide us over until our house down here closes (not a problem as they are selling fast) as we want to do a few things to the house up there before moving in and don't want to have to rent, so getting something short term like a 3/1 or even 1/1.

My question is......where is a good place to check for a mortgage that has reasonable closing costs? I have checked a couple places with calculators and a couple others we would consider won't give me any info unless I actually apply and send them all our info, which I don't want to do yet. My concern is that the places I have been able to get calculated info from are quoting us somewhere around $10K for closing costs. I feel this is awfully high for a $345K house ($275K mortgage).

Any suggestions from people who have done this lately?

[EnjoyEveryDay]

Hi Rothbear,

Was in a similar situation last year. We wound up staying with the same company that held the mortgage on our existing residence, explaining to them that we intended to sell our existing home and then pay off short term mortgage on the "second" home within 2-3 years. We opted for a 5/1 ARM.

That said, we were amazed at all the red tape. Even though the finance company had all of our past records (for 3 homes that we had mortgaged with them), saw that we had never missed a mortgage payment (in fact were paying it off early), had a top tier FICO score, and were putting 66% down on our "second" home in Delaware, at times it seemed we were being treated like some young 20's first time buyers with no credit history. Just a sign of the fall out from the lax reviews and resultant housing crisis of the mid-late 2000's.

I'd recommend checking Lending Tree and Bankrate.com as two possible information sources if you haven't already. Believe you can get ballpark quotes on rates and fees without a lot of detailed application. Perhaps your real estate agent or folks on this board can recommend others.

Hope this helps!

[rdlr]

Originally Posted by rothbear

Any suggestions from people who have done this lately?

I haven't done that lately, but my line of work entails working with hundreds of mortgage companies all over the country, on a daily basis and over a period of 27 years. From that experience, I'd recommend a local mortgage company with a brick and mortar location in Delaware. There are many good ones, including New Penn Financial, Wells Fargo, Calliber, First Preference, Atlantic Home Loans and others. My interaction (and getting paid) is always much better with "local". Out-of-state mortgage companies utilize out-of-state title searchers who don't know the area. Some of their guidelines are unreasonable when underwriting a loan. Personally, dealing with companies in faraway places usually results in slower answers to my questions, and slower payment of my invoices. DM if you'd like more info.

Regarding closing costs for a mortgage....I've seen some pretty hefty amounts, from most mortgage companies. Shop around.

[newmassphd]

Originally Posted by rothbear

We are getting near time to consider applying for a mortgage for our new house in Dover.

Any suggestions from people who have done this lately?

I've heard positive things from a friend about Delaware One Credit Union and Pike Creek Mortgage.
I have no affiliation with either institution. The credit union requires membership which
requires opening an account with something like $10.

[rothbear]

rdlr............New Penn is the one we talked with who actually does a lot of them at Nobles Pond. Again, though, their closing costs were in the neighborhood of $11K, however theirs included the HOA capital buy in as well as 8.5 months of HOA dues that is required at closing. That's why I am wondering if that is pretty normal for the area. Once adding those to the $10K at TD Bank and that actually makes them more.

But then again, I guess it has to do with the "tax stamps" of over $5K to the county (or state, not sure which).

We are coming up for our pre-drywall walkthrough Monday or Tuesday so I guess we can visit a few more, but really guess we need to get moving if we want to close the middle of April.

[rdlr]

Originally Posted by rothbear

We are coming up for our pre-drywall walkthrough Monday or Tuesday so I guess we can visit a few more, but really guess we need to get moving if we want to close the middle of April.

Buyer pays 1.5% of Delaware Transfer Tax, and Seller pays the same. It may have changed to 2%; but I'm not completely up to date on that. Nobles Pond is not in a jurisdiction, so no transfer tax to a town. Nonetheless, whatever mortgage company you go to, you'll pay that Delaware Transfer Tax.

[Annino]

Rothbear, have you looked into getting a home equity loan on your present home?

[rothbear]

Originally Posted by Annino

Rothbear, have you looked into getting a home equity loan on your present home?

We are actually selling in a couple of months, so don 't want to go through the hassle and cost of that. Homes here sell pretty quickly, mostly less than 30 days if priced correctly and many within a week. We were trying to time it so that we would close on this sale about a month after closing on the new one so that we don't have to rent a place or store anything. We will probably only have the mortgage a month or 2 so that's why I was hoping to find somewhere that the closing costs aren't so high. We have the cash for all of it, I just thought that those rates were pretty steep.

We are driving up tomorrow for our pre-drywall walkthrough and I'm excited to see what they have done. A friend I met here on C-D has been sending me some pix, but there is nothing like actually seeing it. We will be meeting with the New Penn guy as well as checking into the Dover FCU since our community is affiliated so we can become members. Won't be able to get up there again until the 2 week before closing walkthrough.